They got the prizes because they award themselves prizes or strong armed others to do so.

How many have heard of the Catholic priest Georges Lemaitre? How many have heard of Einstein?(who said Lamaitre didn't know physics).

Einstein, that momser.

Stockholm and Oslo are of course well-known centers of the Elders of Zion.(sarcasm intended)

Jewish academic success has precious little to do with genetics. Anyone who has ever been to a Hebrew school knows that there is no shortage of truly stupid Jews.

It does however have lots to do with culture. Just as with East Asian and Hindu kids, school is serious business and you are expected to achieve. Your academic success is the family's number 1 focus. If you aren't doing well, you can expect to suffer the consequences from punishment at home to opprobrium from the relatives, or the humiliation of needing tutoring. Academic success is rewarded.

My parents actually discouraged my participation in competitive sports until high school when my dad realized that colleges want kids to have some broader experience than mere academics. No Little League and Pop Warner but lots of music lessons and museum and zoo trips. My father could be quite disparaging of Jewish parents who insisted that their kids play Little League, join the Boy Scouts etc.

Scientists who fear conclusions are not fully scientists at all, by definition. Sophists in scientistic clothing might be a more accurate description.

I didn't know this was still even arguable. If survival depended on intelligence, the intelligent survived and procreated. Over the years, the gene pool had more brains than brawn. No big mystery here.

Survival of the fittest whether in the Jewish and Asian communities or the snail darter. Isn't that what evolution teaches us. It's quite amusing when the left's pet theories come back to bite them.

Now they're trying to manually reverse the evolutionary process by affirmative action. We'll just sit back and see how that works out for them.

But it didn't/doesn't

More than 3/4 of Jews voted for kerry. How smart could we be?

Voting for the Democrat is a reflex action, not a intellectual exercise. Jews have been conditioned to fear the Christian right. I've had this conversation many many times and never broken through the resistance.

Intelligence is the ability to use the rational facilities to overcome instinct.

Robert:

No, tragically, intelligence is the ability to rationalize decisions already made instinctively.

OJ:

No, reward those who can do math and the group becomes better at it, at the expense of other things, if necessary. The mechanism isn't Lamarckian at all.

And passes it on, thus, Lamarckian.

erp:

Here's a last-shot gambit.

There's evidence that brain function can be improved by omega-3 fatty acids and the amino acide tyrosine.

In other words, the Jewish IQ is due to lox with cream cheese.

Joseph

Lox with cream cheese! You mean all that talk about it being due to gefilte fish was a joke and I've been gagging for nothing all these years? You guys have a very warped sense of humour.

matt, I need no convincing. Growing up in NYC, most of my friends were Jews. My best friend for coming up to fifty years now and I have battled this out for decades. She votes Republican in local elections, but can't seem to get her hand to pull that lever for the Republican in national elections. I hope we both live long enough to see that happen.

On a bright note her son who is very succressful in the media, is a closet conservative and claims there are a lot more like him. Allah akbar.

BTW - I don't believe I've ever seen any numbers on how Asians vote. Now's a good time for the GOP to start targeting them, especially in California.

Peter: You don't think we really eat that stuff, do you? Yuck.

I bought two bottles of gefilte fish for passover and could not bring myself to open them. If anybody wants them send me your mailing address.

You guys are trying to be funny (I hope), but this is very dangerous.

What Harpending and Orrin are preaching is the same deal that the Nazis preached -- the Jews, clever fellows, are running the world.

Somehow, though, they overlooked the fact (and it was a fact) that more German Jews were tailors than anything else. They weren't all mathematicians.

Harry:

See how easy it is?

Actually, Harry, what Harpending is doing is trying to save evolutionary biology. You have no choice but to be on his side.

David:

But even Harry can't be when he sees how idiotic his ideas are when carried to their logical ends.

this is very dangerous

First, what are you doing making an argument from consequence, Harry? You're the scientist here, as you never tire of reminding us, so I should expect that's verboten for you -- wherever your technique leads you, there you must follow.

Second, thank you Captain Obvious! Science can have noxious side effects. Stab me.

Third, what are you doing blaming oj for the consequences of an idea that he rejects and you relentlessly promote?

joe:

scientist? He's the most subjective person here.

It's lousy science, because the initial concept, as I demonstrated with a reference to the German census (I'll get the reference if you need it, it was from a political science study of Nordhausen, though I cannot recall the author's name) was mistaken.

It's not science, just Darwinism. Require an accurate initial census and you have to toss every putative example of evolution.

Please do. Amazing coincidence, that: science that points to conclusions you can't stomach is uniformly lousy science. Here's hoping your luck holds.

The problem with Harpending's theory is its sloppiness. Any reasonably well-trained math geek will tell you that 'correlation does not mean causation.' He hasn't discussed culture as a prime motivator. Since phenotypical variation is the result of genetic AND environmental variation he might want to do that. Also, a study of the differences in achievement levels of the children of religious intermarriage between Jews and non-Jews or that of non-Jewish children adopted by Jewish parents in comparison to children of Jewish ancestry might prove valuable. In the US, the relevant sample sizes are certainly large enough to draw a satisfactory conclusion.

The notion that IQ remains static throughout one's life, as this study would require in order to have any probative value whatsoever, is pure hokum.

I doubt most German Jews were tailors but I have little doubt that most were in retail trade of various sorts whether tailoring or brokerage or baking. That is certainly true of Alsace until 1945. Today, most are professionals, but the community is less than 10% of its prewar size.

Robert,

I'm convinced that all the gefilte fish and fruitcake in the world will someday end up at Yucca Mountain.

I did not say most German Jews were tailors.

I said more were tailors than anything else.

There most likely is not a gene for being a tailor.

So much for Harpending.

Of course there's no gene for it. Sic transit evolutionary psychology.